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OfSTED

I’m sick and tired of hearing things From uptight, short-sighted, narrow-minded hypocritics All I want is the truth Just gimme some truth I’ve had enough of reading things By neurotic, psychotic, pig-headed politicians All I want is the truth Just gimme some truth I’m sick to death of seeing things From tight-lipped, condescending, mamas little … Continue reading →

My post on Thursday, Meeting OfSTED: The Game has Changed has blasted all my previous blog stats out of the water, heading for 50,000 views in three days. (Update: Now 80,000) It’s been an astonishing few days of questions and queries about the real meaning of what is going on. Mike Cladingbowl has published a … Continue reading →

This post follows on from the excellent accounts from David Didau (@LearningSpy) and Ross McGill (@TeacherToolkit) about our meeting with Mike Cladingbowl at OfSTED HQ on Tuesday this week. (Update: Shena Lewington (@ClerktoGovernor) and Tom Bennett have now also written accounts of the meeting.) For me, this was the second time I’d met Mike Cladingbowl, … Continue reading →

In the last week, a series of events and meetings at my school signalled collectively that we’ve turned a corner with our view of some key processes. How we evaluate and improve the quality of teaching overall. The role of lesson observations The way we regard our action research activities as a feature of self-evaluation and … Continue reading →

One of the key issues for us, as it is in any school, is to ensure that the quality of teaching and learning is as good as it can be. This requires us to engage every teacher and every department in a continuing cycle of evaluation, feedback and planned improvement. Over the last two years … Continue reading →

I’m convinced that our existing accountability framework is preventing schools from improving at the pace that they could be or in the way that they should be. OfSTED and Performance Tables dominate the thinking of too many Heads and teachers to a degree that is unhealthy, unnecessary and counterproductive. I have written about these issues … Continue reading →

I am in the fortunate position of being the line manager for Art at KEGS and over the last couple of weeks I’ve been involved in the Art Departmental Review. This a process that involves observing everyone in the department, giving individual feedback then team feedback and looking more widely at achievement issues overall. We … Continue reading →